Pleased with the point tonight. Its weird reading through the thread at the polar opposite opinions for different performances tonight.
Chesney was quality tonight as per usual. Sagna was good as normal. Mertesacker looked shaky at times in regards to distribution and his lack of pace looks incredibly easy to take advantage of but his positioning was sound. Kos had a terrible first half but pulled himself together second half. Gibbs looked dodgy again at times but looked like he was fighting for it and I hope he can improve this season with a prolonged run.
Yossi is a player I have always liked and I thought he was good tonight. Put a real shift in and despite him seeing to divide opinions I think he'll do a good job. Arteta put another good performance in. Song was absolutely shocking in the first half and I don't think he deserves as much credit as he has been given tonight. His tackling and mopping up was excellent second half, but his passing was criminal. I'm being serious when I say I didn't see him complete a pass until around the 55th minute. Unnaceptable at any level, let alone in europe. Gervinho needs to stick his head up and Wenger needs to put Walcott up front and change our shit formation or sell him as he is not a good enough winger for league 2. Van Persie classy as always. God knows where we would be without him.
Overall, not convinced by us yet. Hopefully these players will continue to gel and we can challenge the top 4.
CL: Borusia Dortmund Match Thread
Excellent result for us. But I worry about our tactical thinking. We were struggling to pass the ball through midfield all game. They were closing us down and putting pressure on. How many times did Arteta have to turn back towards our own goal with the ball and pass it back to a defender. We just won't accept that sometimes we cannot out-pass certain teams and that when that happens we should by-pass the midfield, hump the ball up front and pressure their defenders. How did we get our goal? From RvP pressuring their defender, winning the ball for Theo who put in a defence splitting ball.
But happy with the effort on the pitch apart from when Chamakh came on. He just ambled around up front when a bit of extra pressure was needed.
But happy with the effort on the pitch apart from when Chamakh came on. He just ambled around up front when a bit of extra pressure was needed.
Check this out IHHI Hate Hleb wrote:I'm not disputing that tonight wasn't another Copenhagen, only the claim that 'Parma barely got a kick' in that final, which you made!!!
However, if I get time tomorrow I'll try and track down some highlights of the match to see if old age and 30 years of spliff smoking has affected my memory.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQDULgLXwBs
Another Copenhagan dont make me laugh.Parma were a miles better team than us.Look at their front 3.But we had a wall defending our goal.The famous back 5.Bouldys finest hour and a half.A masterclass of backs to the wall defending.Remember the midfield two were Morrow and Selley
I would love to know if this was true. Chesney alluded to it in the post match interview and I believe these players do need a rocket occasionally to up their game. AW clearly doesn't do that and the players think everything is OK when it isn't.frankbutcher wrote:It's quite simple....
We were terrible defensively first half. Then..........
Pat Rice gave them a rocket at half-time. Then we came out and defended like heroes for the second half.
If Wenger was on the touch-line we would have lost that game.
Football is a game of tomorrows
We really need to stop living in the past.
Times have changed. We are not a top 4 team at this moment in time so you need to adjust your expectations and criticisms.
Picking on every single mistake made by the players and ignoring their good moments - Theo killer pass, Kos magnificent block, Yossi great work rate, etc
is starting to pi55 me off and I am one of the grumpiest, cynical pessimists and you lot are making me feel depressed with your negativity.
Sir Geoff Hurst said "Football is a game of tomorrows"
We need to look forward.
It was a good team performance last night. encouraging signs of improving defence, commitment and workrate.
Give me substance over style this season and I will get behind the team again.
Let's hope we take that into the Blackburn game and we can start to gain some confidence that our season will not be a complete disaster.
Times have changed. We are not a top 4 team at this moment in time so you need to adjust your expectations and criticisms.
Picking on every single mistake made by the players and ignoring their good moments - Theo killer pass, Kos magnificent block, Yossi great work rate, etc
is starting to pi55 me off and I am one of the grumpiest, cynical pessimists and you lot are making me feel depressed with your negativity.
Sir Geoff Hurst said "Football is a game of tomorrows"
We need to look forward.
It was a good team performance last night. encouraging signs of improving defence, commitment and workrate.
Give me substance over style this season and I will get behind the team again.
Let's hope we take that into the Blackburn game and we can start to gain some confidence that our season will not be a complete disaster.
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franksav63
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I was so pissed off after the Swansea game that I thought we'd get stuffed last night and we really should have been 3 or 4 down before we actually scored, but in the end, I was really quite proud of us getting a draw there last night.
Song, Gibbs and Kos were dire in that first half but we re-grouped and they all had really good games in the 2nd half, the contrast between the 1st half and 2nd half were stark, the game resembled one of our games in the past whereby, we had plenty of possession, wasted chances and then end up being beaten, it was a pleasure to be on the other end of that situation last night. I'm confident that we'll qualify from that group now.
Song, Gibbs and Kos were dire in that first half but we re-grouped and they all had really good games in the 2nd half, the contrast between the 1st half and 2nd half were stark, the game resembled one of our games in the past whereby, we had plenty of possession, wasted chances and then end up being beaten, it was a pleasure to be on the other end of that situation last night. I'm confident that we'll qualify from that group now.
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Swale_Gooner1985
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Then you clearly have no concept of what makes a good performance or a good footballer, you probably thought Walcott played wellM-50 wrote:Benayoun was woeful in my opinion. Gave the ball away on every occasion and his positioning was dreadful. 31-year-old with an average football career. He is not good enough to play for us in midfield in the Champions League. Please p*ss off back to chelski
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DB10GOONER
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Not a terrible result (away draw to German champions) BUT a terrible sucker punch to concede a sloppy goal (not the finish, but our part in it) so late on.
They never looked like scoring from open play (despite coming close on a few occasions) so it was always going to be from a set piece. And then Song hands them the opportunity, giving away another silly unesseccary free kick within range of the goal, allowing them to get numbers in the box and putting us under pressure.
The strike for the goal was incredible and no one can be blamed for that shot going in, but my point is we should not have been back there under that pressure at that time. Song is still a liability IMHO. He seems to get the dificult stuff right at times, and then fucks up the simple stuff - he'll scrap and battle and win posession and then just fuck the ball away to the oppo. Or he'll lunge in and give away a stupid free kick when all he needed to do was track the guy. Drives me fucking nuts.
Gibbs was woeful. As was Theo Theo tbh.
RVP's finish was top notch and on his "wrong" foot too! Arteta and Benny did ok, they worked hard but looked a tad off the pace so hopefully this will come with more games. Chez was good as was Sagna - especially as he had no help or cover whatsoever from either Gervinho or Walcott.
And Gervinho? My god I hope last night was a blip because he looked like a retarded Tony Daly for most of it. He'd get the ball, put his head down and run straight into the oppo players time after time. Absolute shit performance. Even Queenie Lawrenson was giving out shite about him in the commentary.
Mert looked good, his positioning is good but with Kos beside him we are still weak at the back. Please hurry back TV5.
They never looked like scoring from open play (despite coming close on a few occasions) so it was always going to be from a set piece. And then Song hands them the opportunity, giving away another silly unesseccary free kick within range of the goal, allowing them to get numbers in the box and putting us under pressure.
The strike for the goal was incredible and no one can be blamed for that shot going in, but my point is we should not have been back there under that pressure at that time. Song is still a liability IMHO. He seems to get the dificult stuff right at times, and then fucks up the simple stuff - he'll scrap and battle and win posession and then just fuck the ball away to the oppo. Or he'll lunge in and give away a stupid free kick when all he needed to do was track the guy. Drives me fucking nuts.
Gibbs was woeful. As was Theo Theo tbh.
RVP's finish was top notch and on his "wrong" foot too! Arteta and Benny did ok, they worked hard but looked a tad off the pace so hopefully this will come with more games. Chez was good as was Sagna - especially as he had no help or cover whatsoever from either Gervinho or Walcott.
And Gervinho? My god I hope last night was a blip because he looked like a retarded Tony Daly for most of it. He'd get the ball, put his head down and run straight into the oppo players time after time. Absolute shit performance. Even Queenie Lawrenson was giving out shite about him in the commentary.
Mert looked good, his positioning is good but with Kos beside him we are still weak at the back. Please hurry back TV5.
Thought we were terrible to a man in the first half, and I include Mert and Sagna in that. Much better performance in second half, they actually looked like a "team" working hard for each other. Songs foul was stupid as there was plenty of cover, what I have noticed is that he seems to foul when the opponent is on "his" right side.
The awfulness of the first half performance however should not be under estimated, on another night or against a citeh or utd there would have been no point in coming out for the second half as the game would have been over.
The awfulness of the first half performance however should not be under estimated, on another night or against a citeh or utd there would have been no point in coming out for the second half as the game would have been over.
in the first half we were being overun , second half ok. Why was there no outlet. Walcott was poor on sat and but for the pass poor last night , has he been sussed out ?
Gibbs too , looks out of his depth and again was poor on sat.
Look at the records over the last two years , without Fab we struggle , why the hell did we let him go with 4 years on his contract ??? (wil nt mention it again).
The second half was better , lets see how we battle sat lunchtime against a poor Blackburn team.
Gibbs too , looks out of his depth and again was poor on sat.
Look at the records over the last two years , without Fab we struggle , why the hell did we let him go with 4 years on his contract ??? (wil nt mention it again).
The second half was better , lets see how we battle sat lunchtime against a poor Blackburn team.
I was rather pleased with that performance overall. The late goal is gutting but it was certainly a good goal.
I was impressed by all our back 4 last night, especially in the 2nd half where they really put a shift in. Still a lot of work to do to become a unit, but there has definitely been some work done in that.
Song certainly improved in the 2nd half. We have got to stop him going forward with the ball as this is when we get caught out. Just pass it to someone better!
Arteta and Benayoun both struggled with distribution from the defence and to the forwards. This led to a lot of wasted possession and increased pressure on the back four which eventually led to the equalising goal.
Gervinho looks tricky and his movement with the ball is excellent. However he kept running down dead ends and losing the ball. On two opportunities though, his never give up attitude created two chances, one was saved well and the other fluffed a bit. In the past Hleb (seems to be a similar player) would have just given up and we would have lost the ball.
Walcott didn't create enough space for himself, our midfielders desperately needed him to get behind the defence so we could clear our lines but there didn't seem to be a clear plan for him.
RvP, great finish and when he was in the final third he caused constant problems. I felt he sat too deep in the 2nd half though, which again gave our midfielders no out ball to alleviate the pressure. Just felt he was too static late on in the game
I was impressed by all our back 4 last night, especially in the 2nd half where they really put a shift in. Still a lot of work to do to become a unit, but there has definitely been some work done in that.
Song certainly improved in the 2nd half. We have got to stop him going forward with the ball as this is when we get caught out. Just pass it to someone better!
Arteta and Benayoun both struggled with distribution from the defence and to the forwards. This led to a lot of wasted possession and increased pressure on the back four which eventually led to the equalising goal.
Gervinho looks tricky and his movement with the ball is excellent. However he kept running down dead ends and losing the ball. On two opportunities though, his never give up attitude created two chances, one was saved well and the other fluffed a bit. In the past Hleb (seems to be a similar player) would have just given up and we would have lost the ball.
Walcott didn't create enough space for himself, our midfielders desperately needed him to get behind the defence so we could clear our lines but there didn't seem to be a clear plan for him.
RvP, great finish and when he was in the final third he caused constant problems. I felt he sat too deep in the 2nd half though, which again gave our midfielders no out ball to alleviate the pressure. Just felt he was too static late on in the game
Shut up. How? I don't even think that was a Free kick. Even if it was, Song was fantastic second half.sloppy goal (not the finish, but our part in it) so late on.
As for my Copenhagen reference, what I meant was last night reminded me of those old Arsenal performances in Europe. They had all the play but, especially second half, never really looked like scoring. Parma were excellent that night, Bould and Seamo kept us winning that game. As Merson said after the match though, even the back 5 couldn't have done anything in that game.
Copenhagen was the best night of my life away with Arsenal, but I remember during the 90 being shit scared whenever one of their front 3 got on the ball.
richpye wrote:
Gervinho looks tricky and his movement with the ball is excellent. However he kept running down dead ends and losing the ball. On two opportunities though, his never give up attitude created two chances, one was saved well and the other fluffed a bit. In the past Hleb (seems to be a similar player) would have just given up and we would have lost the ball.
Please explain this for an old man - how the fcuk was his movement with the ball excellent if you say that he kept running down dead ends losing the ball ??
Fact is that he has zero awareness to the point that he makes theo look intelligent and that is saying something 
There are a lot of reasons that merit giving a new signing time to settle especially when moving into a new league such as communication, understanding team-mates positioning, pace of the game etc........what you cannot defend or make allowances for is a poor 1st touch and a lack of intelligence on the pitch and gervinho def falls into that 2nd grouping 